


Patchwork

by sneakyslytherin



Category: Sherlock (TV), Sherlock Holmes & Related Fandoms
Genre: M/M, One Shot, Winglock
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-12-04
Updated: 2013-12-04
Packaged: 2018-01-03 10:05:20
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,954
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1069187
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sneakyslytherin/pseuds/sneakyslytherin
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>John has always kept his fragile wings a secret, from the playgrounds of his childhood into the deserts of Afghanistan. When tragedy strikes, however, John is forced to return to England to seek a fresh start. Can he keep his wings and his past hidden under the careful scrutiny of Sherlock Holmes?<br/>Johnlock, Winglock, Post-Reichenbach, T for mild language.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Patchwork

Not everyone had wings.

 

Being Winged or Wingless wasn’t a determinant of social status, similar to how the colour of your eyes wouldn’t prevent you from getting whatever job you choose. Being Winged wasn’t usually an indication of any particular personality trait, although stereotypically a Winged individual would have a more eccentric personality than a Wingless.

But that’s just a stereotype.

Wings had become a part of normal human existence; most stores catered to Winged and Wingless clientele, providing the latest fashions with and without subtle slits in the back that kept the Winged comfortable. Britain had been ruled by exactly 46 Wingless Prime Ministers and 28 Winged. Cinemas had Winged- and Wingless-friendly seats to attempt to please all potential customers. So, for the most part, there was virtually no difference between the Winged and the Wingless.

Except, of course, for those who _lost_ their wings.

Wings were fragile, beautiful constructions of hollow bones and feathers, held together tenuously by sinew and flesh. A bullet could render a wing useless, while exposure to radiation could cause all of the feathers to slide to the ground in a gradual, tragic cascade. Sometimes, wings would become infected or damaged, and had to be removed by surgery.

Whatever the reason, if an individual was so reckless as to _lose_ their wings, society punished them for their carelessness. They were given a beautiful privilege, and they had squandered it.

These individuals were known as the ‘Lost’.

It was possible to hide being a Lost, concealing your lack of wings, moving away from everyone you had known and starting fresh. Most of these people, however, were forced to lead solitary lifestyles, not letting anyone get close enough to see the telltale, never-fading black crisscrossed scars marring their shoulder blades.

John Watson had never let anyone know that he had wings. His father had wings, - large, brown-and-white wings, similar to an eagle - and so did his sister, - smaller, grey wings, like a dove or a particularly clean pigeon - but his mother had been Wingless all her life. She’d died when John was very young, leaving his father to pull himself apart from the inside and his sister to slowly drown herself in self-pity and liquor.  The one solid memory that John had of his mother was from when John was around six years old; his mother had locked the bathroom door and had pulled off his jumper, lifting up one of his gossamer-thin wings and holding it up to the light.

“Your wings are like glass,” she’d said, stroking John’s transparent feathers with one hand and his blonde unruly hair with the other. “Beautiful, but so, so, _so_ easy to break.”

As John aged, he’d understood his mother’s logic; it was better to be considered a permanent member of the Wingless than to break and lose his fragile, unique wings. So, John hid his wings. When he’d gone in for his passport sitting as a teen, he hadn’t questioned the government official’s assumption that he was a Wingless, watching her check the box with permanent red ink. The presence of his gossamer wings beneath his jumper had seemed to burn holes in his lying skin. John had worn a white undershirt during his deployment in Afghanistan, his wings too thin to show through the cheap fabric – and if anyone did see a flash of something that looked like feathers, they’d dismiss it as the sun, or a trick of the light. No one could have transparent wings, after all.

Only one person ever knew about John’s wings; Roger Culpepper, John’s mate and comfort since the dawn of time, graced with a freckled, light complexion, honey-blonde hair, and a smile the size of the Channel. When they were little neither John nor Roger had thought much of John’s wings – some people had them, some people didn’t, and it wasn’t that big of a deal. As they’d gotten older, though, they’d discovered the importance of keeping John’s wings a complete and total secret. Their friendship had grown closer and closer as they aged, until finally, on Roger’s eighteenth birthday, John finally worked up the nerve to kiss Roger for the very first time.

When Roger kissed him back, John knew that he had found someone perfect for him, someone that he could trust implicitly with his wings and his heart in equal measure.

Then John was shot, and everything changed.

John and Roger had signed up for the RAMC together, with John going into the field as a combat doctor while Roger stayed behind in Kandahar to work the more specialized medical cases.

John had been deployed with his division, the Fifth Northumberland Fusiliers, when they’d come across an undetected minefield. John was trying desperately to work triage on Paul Ramsey, one of his closest mates within the division. Paul had been hit with shrapnel from behind, peppering his back and his large, black, raven-like wings with irregularly-shaped iron. Writhing in pain as the hot, fragmented metal tore into his thin muscle and cracked his feathers into shards, all that John could understand was Paul mumbling that he “couldn’t be Lost”, “promised I wouldn’t be Lost”.

“It’s alright, mate,” John had said, radioing for an evac and trying to pull a large piece of wickedly hooked shrapnel out from just beside Ramsey’s spine before it could do any further damage. “I promise I’ll get you home in one piece.”

Reflected in the screen of his satellite radio, John had seen the marksman aiming directly for Paul’s head. It was pure instinct to throw himself between his injured patient and the shooter, his back facing the attacker as he covered Paul’s exposed face and injured wing.

The bullet had ripped through John and imbedded itself in the ground after ricocheting off of Paul’s bullet-proof vest. John had slowed the bullet’s trajectory enough to save Paul’s life, but maybe not enough to save his own. The last thing John heard before he blacked out was his mother’s voice; _“Beautiful, but so easily broken…”_

After he’d ridden out both the surgery to remove the bullet fragments from his back, as well as the resulting infection, John had woken to see Roger sitting in a chair by his bedside, fingers laced together beneath his chin. Large purple bags marred his usually bright expression, and his eyes had the deep, worn expression saved for those who had seen far more than they should. 

Roger lifted his hand slowly. “They’re still there,” he said in a low voice, his eyes searching John’s. “The left one is severely damaged though. I did my best to fix it without having to request Winged-specific medication.”

John’s dry throat refused to let him speak, the words getting stuck to the sides of his vocal cords. “Is – is Paul alright?”

Roger shook his head, a strange pensive look on his face. “You just about get blown to pieces, and all you ask about is Paul.” Roger sighed, a strained smile pulling at his skin. “Janet was looking after him” he said. “I’ll go check on him for you – last I heard he was fine.” With that, Roger placed a dry, caring kiss on John’s sweat-drenched forehead before standing up and leaving the medical room. John, relieved beyond words, just smiled and sank into a drug-induced slumber with the comforting knowledge that Roger was there, and that they were both ok, and that everything would be fine.

When John next awoke, there was a crying nurse sitting in the chair. Before she even spoke, John’s heart dropped into the pit of his stomach. “He’s gone,” he said, phrasing it as a statement rather than a question.

Nodding, the nurse had said in a disjointed, emotional voice, “I’m sorry, Doctor Watson. I know you two were close.”

There was a long silence in the room. John had seen loss, had experienced loss, and knew the deep, cutting grief that followed it. He’d watched grown men, tougher men than him, dissolve into tears in the hot desert sand. But that grief….it wasn’t the familiar knife-edge of pain that John knew so well. Instead, it was as if an unseen hand had reached into his body, and stolen the very essence of John’s being. “How?” He asked, his voice deceptively strong.

“IED placed just outside of Kandahar,” the nurse sniffed. “He was going out with Paul to give him a last round with the boys before he got sent back home. Neither one of them made it out.”

Something unmistakably important broke inside of John that day, and settled into his soul in an unbearable, heart-wrenching manner. For the first time in his life, John was genuinely alone.

 

When John returned to London, the empty bedsit had given his mind far too much time to contemplate Roger and the complexities of death. John couldn’t bear to look at his wings, even in private, and hadn’t even seen the damage done to his left wing by the marksman’s bullet. He never intended to ever look at his bloody wings ever again.

One morning he found himself staring far too intently at his Browning, looking down the barrel and trying to imagine what it would be like to see the bullet in the fraction of a moment before it actually hit him. “Alright, that’s enough Watson,” he’d said, shoving the Browning back into his bedside drawer and grabbing his cane. “Time for some fresh air.”

It was just a coincidence that John had run into Mike Stamford in Regent’s Park that day, and even more of a coincidence that he’d walked into the lab at Saint Bart’s and met Sherlock Holmes.

“Afghanistan or Iraq?”

John had stared, baffled, at the strange curly-haired, dark, mysterious man in-front of him. A pair of large black wings, comparable to raven wings, seemed to fill up the entire chemistry laboratory and make the man look even more intimidating.

“…sorry?”

Sighing as if he was greatly put upon, Sherlock turned to face John. “Which was it, Afghanistan or Iraq?”

In the next minute, Sherlock rattled off half-a-dozen conclusions about John and his life that even John himself barely remembered. Harry’s alcoholism had faded from his mind, and his tan from Afghanistan seemed like it should have physically faded by now in the pale British sunlight.

But the one thing that Sherlock failed to observe were John’s wings, tucked very closely to his body, bound tightly to his chest with white bandages, and hidden under a deceptively bulky jumper. As John was leaving Saint Bart’s with Mike, still reeling over Sherlock’s brilliance and enthusiasm for the world around him, Mike asked him, “So, what do you think?”

“He’s brilliant,” John said, a faint smile creeping up onto his lips. “Fantastic.”

“Don’t lie to him about shirking on the rend, mind you,” Mike said laughing, “there ain’t nothing that you can get past Sherlock Holmes.”

The dread and exhausted, constant suspicion settled back into John’s stomach. “We’ll see how tomorrow goes,” he said, feigning nonchalance. “What was the address again? 231 something-or-other?”

 

The next day, after getting dragged into a cab to some sort of crime scene ( _who is this bloke anyways?_ ), John’s fear was assuaged as Sherlock rattled off a seemingly endless list of deductions he’d made about John in the first thirty seconds he’d seen him. Again, none of these observations pertained to John’s wings.

“That’s extraordinary,” John had said, his voice a touch more enthusiastic than he’d intended.

“Really?” Sherlock had said, surprise colouring his tone. “That’s not what people normally say.”

“What do people normally say?”

“Piss off.”

A small smile had flitted across the stoic detective’s face as John watched, brightening up the somber countenance significantly.

_We’ll see how this goes_ , John thought, tentatively exploring the thought of sharing a flat with Sherlock Holmes. _It can’t hurt to at least try_.

 

Two years later, John had been through innumerable bombings, kidnappings, brushes with death, and chases through the back alleys of London, and was still living more-or-less comfortably with Sherlock Holmes. Thoughts of Roger were compartmentalized in his mind, overwhelmed by Sherlock’s enthusiasm and eccentricities. The ache had subsided slightly, still present but an undercurrent to what was going around him in his new, insane life. He still had to take incredible care to conceal his wings beneath jumpers that he _knew_ Sherlock would hate, but so far the detective hadn’t been able to deduce the wings’ existence yet. _We see what we expect to see_ , John thought one morning as he shuffled down the stairs to find Sherlock ranting about Winged officers shedding all over his crime scene.

On a night in early December, when small half-hearted flecks of snow drifted from the dark sky, John and Sherlock had cornered a thief who had a particular knack for breaking into important safety deposit boxes. Sherlock had rattled off his usual threats and deductions, but had apparently miscalculated the thief’s desperation; unexpectedly, the wiry man lurched at the detective with a previously-unnoticed knife. John’s reaction had been a fraction too late, and the knife had slashed across Sherlock’s upper left arm, tearing through his coat fabric and biting into the alabaster skin beneath.

In a flash of motion, John had the thief on the ground, unconscious, and cuffed. With his one free hand, the ex-soldier texted Lestrade and made sure that the police were en route before turning immediately to his stunned, frozen comrade. “Sherlock?” John said, an edge of panic in his tone. “Sherlock, are you alright?”

Amorphous eyes wide, Sherlock met John’s gaze. “That…that was….yes, John, I’m fine.”

“How much damage is there?” John said, stepping up next to Sherlock and examining the line of red blossoming across the detective’s arm. The doctor sucked air in through his teeth, the whistling-noise filling the alleyway. “Sherlock, this will need stitches,” John said, watching the still-frozen detective closely.

“No,” Sherlock said, the word firm but lacking volume or substance. “No, I’m really fine.”

“We should go to Bart’s -”

“You do it,” Sherlock said, interrupting.

“Sherlock, you really should get this done prop -”

“You’re my blogger, and my doctor,” Sherlock said. “There’s no one better.”

Silence filled the alleyway as the two men stared at one another, their warm breath creating curls and wisps of fog in the cold, dense air.

“Alright,” John finally said, his voice quiet. “Hopefully I have the materials at the flat.”

“Of course you do,” Sherlock scoffed. “You keep your first aid kit in immaculate condition, John – you know I observe everything.”

Later that night, when the two men were sandwiched in the small downstairs bathroom, Sherlock’s wings taking up half of the room even folded close, John carefully brought Sherlock’s skin together. John’s breath was far too quick and his actions far too shaky; he thought that the wound looked wrong on Sherlock, the bloody, jagged gap in his arm out-of-place on the unmarked marble-like skin. _Get yourself together, Watson_ , he thought, staring far too intently at his stitches and avoiding Sherlock’s penetrating gaze. _It’s hard to keep your thoughts a secret when you live with a man who sees everything._

Feeling the weight of the silence, John blurted out the first thing that came to mind; “I’ll fix your jacket tomorrow,” he said, his voice too loud for the small room.

Sherlock blinked slowly, his expression detached and puzzled. “Why?” he asked. “I can purchase a new version of the same jacket easily.”

Shrugging and blushing, John focused on his actions even more. “It’s your coat, though,” he said. “It’s no trouble really.”

Humming, Sherlock’s mind descended once more into its whirring, constant action, leaving John alone in the bathroom stitching the vessel of a brilliant brain. Originally John doubted that the detective even noticed that John had stitched the slash in his jacket, but upon occasion the doctor saw Sherlock absentmindedly running his fingertips over the military stitches in his upper sleeve when he was deep in thought. Every time Sherlock moved to touch his left arm, John would look away, trying to conceal the emotions in his face.

Yet Sherlock never seemed to piece together John’s strange reactions that night, or the presence of his wings.

John didn’t know if he was relieved or disappointed that Sherlock never noticed his thin, transparent appendages. On the one hand, he didn’t want Sherlock to think any differently of him for having defective wings. On the other hand, it would have been absolutely blissful for John to be able to trust someone again, to consider giving his heart to this strange, eccentric man who could keep his secret…

By the time John arrived in Baskerville, he was fairly certain that he had fallen in love with the usually distant, aloof detective and all his eccentricities.

Seeing Sherlock on the roof of Saint Bart’s, John didn’t even think of Roger. All he could think was, _No, not now, please no_ , watching the brilliant man with whom he’d been silently in love fall from an impossible height.

In a way, seeing Sherlock’s traumatized body made the pain that much worse; the red soaking into the black coat with the stitching in the upper left arm, and sinking into the glossy black feathers of Sherlock’s broad, glorious wings, now crumpled and deformed. Seeing the deep, crimson blood against the grey, emotionless London cobblestones was too similar to the remembered sight of red seeping into the hungry desert sand, never enough to fill the endless acres of dry with blood, but yet enough to pull the life from so many men and women.

 

That day John’s soul fractured even further, splitting almost completely in half.

 

He didn’t sink into depression, however, as so many assumed he would. In the spirit of his homeland, John kept calm and carried on, living his life in a mechanistic, detached manner that could only be described as ‘existing’. The sparkle in his eyes died, and the laugh-lines around his mouth, once tanned into place by the Afghan sun, became faded from disuse. Lestrade and Mycroft expressed concern originally, but eventually left John to his own devices.

The one-year anniversary of Sherlock’s death found John sitting at home alone, watching telly but not really seeing anything, an untouched tumbler of scotch cradled between his motionless hands. He wasn’t deep in thought, or struggling with his internal emotions; he’d just…stopped. He was frozen, choosing to distance himself rather than feel the pain that he knew was waiting beneath his ribcage and behind his shoulder blades.

The familiar jangling ringtone of his phone brought him floating back down into his semi-reality, and John stared in confusion at the strange number on the screen. “Hello?” he said, lifting the phone to his ear, expecting a salesman or a misdial.

What he didn’t expect was a familiar broken baritone to come echoing out from his phone, breaking through the mist of his existence. “J-John,” the voice said. “S-sorry….it’s….emergency…”

Not even questioning, John leapt to his feet and lunged for his jacket, carelessly slung over the back of his chair. “Where are you?” John asked, his voice calm and collected, not betraying the sudden, frantic beating of his heart. “Sherlock, where are you?”

“Hi…Hyde…”

“Hyde Park?”

“Ye..ye…”

“Sherlock?”

“…”

“Sherlock?! Talk to me!!”

            As John sprinted down the street towards Hyde Park, he kept shouting into his phone, praying that the voice would come back, or give him some sign that Sherlock was still ok.

            When John arrived at Hyde Park, out of breath but fuelled by adrenaline and the first real emotions he’d felt in a year, he sprinted along the Serpentine shouting at the top of his lungs. “Sherlock!” he shouted. “Sherlock Holmes, don’t leave me again, you bastard!”

            A faint cough echoed from John’s right, and he whipped around to see a dark form slumped inside of a boathouse. Faster than he thought possible, John was at the side of the figure, feeling for a pulse and lifting the head up to catch the moonlight. His breath caught as he recognized the prominent cheekbones, unruly curls, and slim frame of his best friend and second, impossible love. “Sherlock,” John breathed, finding a faint, thread pulse beneath the pale – too pale, abnormally pale – neck. “Sherlock, stay with me, I’m calling an ambulance.”

            “N…no….” Sherlock said, his eyelids fluttering but not opening. “Y…you….”

            “Sherlock, don’t be daft,” John said, resting his forehead against Sherlock’s. “You need a proper doctor.”

            “Y…you….”

            “….fuck,” John breathed, wrapping his arms around Sherlock’s overly thin frame and lifting him into his arms too easily. Resting his cheek against Sherlock’s curls, John breathed in the almost-forgotten alkaline scent of his flat mate. “When you’re not dying, you have some serious explaining to do,” John said softly, pressing a chaste, dry kiss to Sherlock’s head.

            After the careful, awkward walk back to 221B, and the cautious procession up the 17 steps, John carefully lay Sherlock down on the detective’s untouched bed. “Sherlock,” John said softly, “I’m going to look for what’s wrong, ok?” Sherlock grunted, his fingers twitching and reaching for John’s hands. The doctor acquiesced, grabbing the detective’s bony hands. “You’re probably suffering from hypothermia, but I need to check for other injuries, ok?”

            “W…win…w….” Sherlock trailed off, unable to coax his lips into forming the full word.

            But John figured it out. Carefully, the doctor peeled back Sherlock’s overcoat, noting the well-worn, now-fraying stitches in the left arm, exposing the detective’s bare chest and wings. Except they weren’t full wings anymore.

            Instead of Sherlock’s former grand, midnight-coloured wings, were two half-crumbling, partially-formed, bloody messes of feathers and membrane. John stifled his gasp, staring at Sherlock with a mix of awe and terror. Lightly running his fingers over the joint where Sherlock’s wings connected to his bones, John watched the skin tremble and contract beneath his fingertips. “How did you do this to yourself?” he said, his voice low.

            Sherlock didn’t respond, instead pulling his face into a grimace and trying to roll away from John’s touch. “No, no, it’s okay,” John reassured him, running his fingers through the detective’s curls. “I’m going to help you, alright? I just need to go get the first aid kid…”

            John took the stairs up to his room two at a time, reaching for the medical kid under his bed, running through any possible emergency procedures he could go through to save Sherlock’s wings. Even if he had an entire hospital of medications and instruments at hand, John had no idea what the precedent for this kind of injury was. No solution was readily coming to mind, and John ground his hands against his forehead. _Think, think, THINK!_

            A strangled, faint cry rose up through the floorboards, and John heard Sherlock’s quiet, broken “John?!” echo through the flat. The sound thrilled his heart, and stiffened his resolve.

            _I’m not going to lose you, Sherlock. I can’t._

 

            Three days later found John taking another two Advils with his tea, his face pale and drawn, awaiting Sherlock’s return to full consciousness. He looked as if he’d been dragged through Hell and back, with his skin grey and translucent, his hair mussed and matted, and his eyes bloodshot, but the aura radiating from him was more positive and present than it had been in a year.

            Slowly closing the door on a finally peaceful-looking Sherlock, John allowed himself to sink onto the couch in the sitting room, his tea growing cold as he immediately slipped into a restful, blissful sleep.

            When John awoke, it was to the sight of a pair of storm-coloured eyes, framed by long lashes and set into an overly-pale, angular face. “Sherlock,” John said, his voice relieved and exhausted, cracking with disuse.

            “John,” Sherlock said, his voice low. “What have you done?”

            John’s heart sank. “What, didn’t it work?” he asked, mildly panicked.

            Looking frustrated, Sherlock weakly pushed John’s feet off the edge of the couch and collapsed onto the burdened piece of furniture. “I…I don’t…” swallowing, Sherlock choked out the phrase, “I don’t understand. How…how did you do this?”

            Blinking, John fully took in the sight of the man before him; he was still too pale, and weak-looking, but gorgeous. The only main different was in Sherlock’s eagle-wings; where they used to be entirely ink-colouerd and black, they were now spotted with periodic patches of transparent material, allowing the winter light from the window to filter through them like a form of stained glass window. Sherlock’s wings had become a gorgeous patchwork of light and dark.

            John smiled, tired but satisfied. “It worked,” he breathed.

            “What worked?” Sherlock snapped. “Who did you take the feathers from? I’ve never seen transparent feathers, but these are definitely _real_! Explain!”

            Wincing, John sat up from the couch to explain himself, but he froze when he took in Sherlock’s expression of sudden revelation. Sherlock had figured it out – the wince had given John away.

            “N…no…John?” the detective stuttered, his eyes wide and his mouth slightly agape. “You…you….you’ve have wings? All this time?”

            Grimacing as he sat up entirely, John nodded. “Well, sort-of,” he corrected.

            With the actions of a man twice his age, John stripped off his bulky, dark jumper to reveal his torso and a large patch of white bandages that he’d used for years to wrap his wings tight to his body. Slowly, John pulled the bandages off to reveal the remnants of his wings. His right wing was marred by the black scorch marks and carnage of the bullet from Afghanistan, but the scar-tissue was the only part of his wings that was still entirely intact. Large patches of transparent feathers were missing from both wings, leaving small crimson-tipped patches in their place. When John fully expanded his wings, they looked more like tattered fragments of lace than actual feathered wings.

            John had rarely seen Sherlock genuinely shocked, but in that moment the detective was entirely speechless. Silence filled the flat, and John shifted awkwardly under Sherlock’s penetrating gaze. “I...um…sorry they don’t match,” he stuttered. “The stitches can come out in a few weeks when our feathers grow together in your wings, but for now be careful. And I wouldn’t shower if I were – oof!”

            In the middle of his strange, rambling explanation, John found himself pinned under Sherlock’s sudden embrace. Most of the light from the room was blocked out, with Sherlock’s new patchwork wings creating a kaleidoscope of light and dark around them. “You had wings,” Sherlock said, his blue-grey eyes staring into John’s warm brown ones.

            “Erm…yes?”

            “And I never noticed?”

            “Yes.”

            “And…and you…you did this -” Sherlock carefully brushed over the raw, open edge of one of John’s feather extraction sites, wincing as John hissed in pain “- for me?”

            “….yes.”

            “I…John…I….why?” Sherlock seemed genuinely puzzled, his eyes raking over John’s form, pressed against the couch. “I…I don’t understand. Why?”

            “Well…I….” Now it was John’s turn to be speechless, the words sticking in his throat. “I…oh fuck it. I love you, you bastard.”

            Sherlock looked as if someone had just slapped him. “….what?”

            Sighing, John closed his eyes to avoid Sherlock’s gaze. “I’ve loved you for a while, and then I lost you, but _you’re back_ , and I would do anything for the person I love and if you leave me again I will skin you I swear.”

            Taking a deep breath, John opened his eyes and saw Sherlock staring back at him meaningfully, his gaze confused. “John…”

            “It’s fine,” John said, pushing Sherlock back, his stomach plummeting. He stood up off the couch and took a step towards the mantle, staring fixedly at the grim, grinning skull. “I…I know it’s just me, and you’re married to your work, and -”

            Sherlock’s hand rested on John’s shoulder and spun him around, and John found a thin finger pressed against his lips. “Shut up, John,” Sherlock said, his voice low.

            And then, the subject of John’s fantasy became reality; with a slow, purposeful motion, Sherlock stepped towards John and pressed their lips together. It wasn’t a perfect kiss by any means – Sherlock’s lips were peeling and cracked, while John’s were dry and chapped – but it was Sherlock, and it was John, and it was _finally happening_ , and John could feel his heart slowly stitching itself back together like the fabric in Sherlock’s coat.

            Drawing back, John ran his fingers gently over the side of Sherlock’s face. “You can’t leave again,” John said, his voice firm.

            “Moriarty’s gone, all of him – Sebastian Moran, his henchman, was the last I found. He…well…I was his captive for a short period, and he specifically targeted my wings. That was the mess you discovered last night.”

            “You…you became a vigilante for a year?” John asked, shocked and terrified simultaneously by the thought of a vengeful, angry Sherlock.

            “That’s a crude term,” Sherlock protested, resting his chin on John’s head, “but essentially correct, I suppose.”

John’s hands clenched against Sherlock’s back, tanging in the fabric of his dressing gown and drawing back slightly. “You’re sure that they’re actually gone?” John asked, his voice strong. “I love you, but I cannot, _cannot_ go through that again.”

“Neither can I,” Sherlock murmured, not breaking his gaze away from John’s. A smile crossed the detective’s features, and he pulled himself closer to John’s solid, anchoring form. “After all,” Sherlock said, chuckling, “I’d be lost without my blogger.”

With a grand, swooping motion, typical of the detective’s usual actions, Sherlock curled his wings around himself and John, dappling the lovers in patches of sunlight. Light, and dark, Sherlock and John, fused together at last.

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks to my friend Kelvin for Beta-ing the story even though he's not a big fan of Johnlock. Please read and review!! :)


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